New     rereading The World's Religions, November 20, 2006

What Is Biodiversity?

Biodiversity is the totality of life on earth.  They are the plants, animals, fungi, and bacteria, all that is alive.  Much of biodiversity cannot speak to us, so we miss out on hearing them if we don't try.  Many are also invisible because we don't see them or pay attention.  But these living things -- leopards, polar bears, golden toads, yew, roses, ants, carion beetles -- are all key threads in the web of life.

Everyday, we are using 40% of the weight of the earth's biodiversity.  Food, clothing, shelter, and medicine all come from biodiversity, even coal and oil are from dead biodiversity.  Can you imagine our lives without plants?  We will all die, but slightly before that, we will not have paper, jeans, furniture, vegetables, and horses.  Often, we think of humans as the creator of wealth.  But while human ingenuity is superb, without biodiversity, it is a rainbow without a sky.
 
Aside from benefitting us directly, biodiversity is important because the 30-100 million species around us today are nature's gene reservoir to secure life.  When everyone is different, if the environment changes, someone can still survive.

With 100 species going extinct every day, we are losing biodiversity.  This is being called "the death of birth" because the very source of life is dying.  But isn't extinction natural?  Yes and no.  Species go extinct all the time, but never at a rate we are seeing today.  Every person eventually dies, though you would not want to die at 10.  Right now, species are going extinct at 1,000 times the natural rate.  Moreover, unlike the earth's 5 previous extinction periods over the past 4.5 billion years, ours the 6th, is the only one caused by one species.

There are many reasons to save biodiversity.  You can find a most eloquent, intelligent, and optimistic response by EO Wilson in The Future of Life.

What Can We Do?

If a person gives us as much as biodiversity does, we would hold on to them dearly.  But here gratitude can be saved as dancers do not thank their partners.  We just need to give what we take.  Plants photosynthesize with energy from the sun, herbivores eat plants, carnivores eat herbivores, and microorganisms decompose, returning nutrients to the earth.  We are part of this cycle and this cycle produces no waste.  But when we produce waste or take more than we need, we are disrupting the web of life that took billions of years to shape, and of which despite our progress, we still know so little.

I am just beginning to learn about the beauty and complexity of the world, but I feel I am very behind.  Nature is so much and I know so little.  But I am grateful to have already found a hero in EO Wilson and a love in biodiversity.  It was a deeply spiritual moment when it occurred to me that I share a common ancestor with all living things and that I live together with them on this fragile blue water planet.  Because the satori was so intoxicatingly beautiful,  I want to learn more about biodiversity and what I can do.  As I looked, I found many gifted and dedicated people working to save biodiversity.   One of them, my beloved professor, gave me a simple 3-step plan.

1. Learn more about biodiversity and conservation biology

Self educate.  I began with a chance read of EO Wilson's The Future of Life.  It was fascinating.

Center for Environmental Research and Conservation (CERC), New York City
CERC is a consortium of 5 NY based scientific institutions: Columbia University, American Musuem of Natural History, New York Botanical Garden, Wildlife Conservation Society, and Wildlife Trust.  Established 1994, part of the Earth Institute at Columbia University.  You can take classes and study for certificate and degree programs here.  My favorite classes so far are Introduction to Ecology, and Evolution and Genetics.

Yale School of Forestry, New Haven
Also has dual degree program with Yale Business School.

2. Reduce our ecological footprint

Earth Day Network Answer truthfully and calculate as accurately as you can.  My ecological footprint is 18.  If everyone in the world lived like me, we would need 3.9 planets.  Read my response here.

Simple Living Network on choosing voluntary simplicity.  We can vote with our money on what has the right to exist in this world.  

3. Spread the word

December 13, 2005, edited December 25, 2005